Three arrested for Haryana girl’s rape, murder (Lead)

Kurukshetra (Haryana), May 27 (IANS) The rape and murder case of a teenaged student in this Haryana town earlier this month has been solved with the arrest of three people, police said Friday.

“We have arrested three persons from near Shahbad town in Kurukshetra district. They are accused of abducting and raping the victim. Our investigation is on and we are interrogating the arrested people,” Kurukshetra’s Assistant Superintendent of Police Parul Kush Jain told IANS.

The three arrested accused were identified as Ranjodh Singh alias Jodha, Gurvinder Singh alias Ginder and Virender Singh alias Vicky. Police sources said that they have confessed to the crime.

The three were brought before a court here, and sent to five days’ police custody.

The girl was kidnapped by some young men from Kurukshetra town, 110 km from Chandigarh, May 4 while she was on her way to school. Her body was recovered by Haryana Police from a village near Karnal town, 30 km from Kurukshetra, two days later.

Following the body’s recovery, irate relatives and residents of Kurukshetra blocked the busy National Highway No.1 in protest against the police failure to arrest the culprits.

The Haryana government had Wednesday decided to hand over the investigation into this case of the Class 12 student’s rape and murder to Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). However, CBI had not formally taken over the probe.

“This is a big achievement of Haryana police. We had only appealed to CBI to take over this case but they had not taken it over,” Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda told reporters in Chandigarh Friday.